Best ZWave plug for the money? (US)

What is the best ZWave plug-in device for the money? I bought one from Monoprice and I can’t get it to pair with my hub. I think it’s defective.

( by plug-in device, I assume you mean a pocket socket? An on/off module that plugs into an existing in wall receptacle? There are a lot of plug-in devices, including sensors, and sometimes people are just looking for a repeater, which is why I ask.)

Any electronic device might be defective, it happens. Monoprice is a budget brand, but I haven’t heard of a particularly higher failure rate with them.

As far as “best” different things work for different people, there are a lot of factors. The device class features FAQ discusses what some of the different features are and why some people might be willing to pay more for one model over another:

The most popular pocket socket in the community is probably the Lowe’s iris smart plug. Although the list price is right around $40, it’s often on sale for 10 or $15 less, and then you can use regular Lowe’s coupons to bring the price down even further.

In addition, it’s a zigbee on/off switch but it also includes a Z wave repeater, which is unusual but helpful. But I don’t know if that meets your requirements as it’s not technically a zwave pocket socket. It’s a zigbee pocket socket that also includes a zwave repeater.

https://www.lowes.com/pd/Iris-Iris-120-Volt-White-Smart-Plug/999925330

As far as a zwave only pocket socket, there are a bunch of different good brands, it really depends on aesthetics and some of the additional features. The Zooz are worth looking at and I think they’re on sale today for cyber Monday.

https://www.thesmartesthouse.com/collections/zooz/products/zooz-z-wave-plus-smart-plug-zen06

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Also, before going any further, did you try doing a general exclusion on the Monoprice? Sometimes even brand new devices are paired with the test network at the factory and the pairing doesn’t get cleared before they ship. So that usually the first thing to try if a zwave device won’t pair.

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Yes I tried this.

I have the Monoprice Zwave (not plus, regular) switch. I could get it to pair, but it would not update status correctly in ST and would eventually drop off and stop responding after a couple weeks. I exchanged it and encountered the same problems with the new one. I followed a tip of a user on the Monoprice listing page to try some stock handlers, and things improve, but just seemed to extend the time till it fell off. I think might actually just have been a coincidence. I gave up and swapped out for a GE/Jasco Zwave (again, regular, not plus) plug in socket and its been rock solid since. Was more expensive but well worth not dealing with the head ache. If you are not stuck on Zwave there are a good number of Zigbee plug ins to choose from and can usually get pretty good deals. I was stuck on Zwave because my Zwave network is far more solid and this was to power a heater so I wanted to make as dependable as possible.